9 killed, dozens injured in Israeli shelling of UN-run center in Gaza’s Khan Younis

By Hania al-Shaer

GAZA CITY, Palestine (AA) – At least nine people were killed and 75 others injured in an Israeli artillery shelling of a UN-run training center sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis city in the southern Gaza Strip, the UN refugee agency said Wednesday.

“Two tank rounds hit a building that shelters 800 people,” Thomas White, Director of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza, said on X.

He added that UNRWA and WHO teams were trying to reach the center.

According to an Anadolu reporter, a fire erupted at the center as a result of the Israeli shelling.

The Israeli army said Tuesday that it has completed a siege around Khan Younis city, which Tel Aviv says is a stronghold for Hamas.

Israel has launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 Hamas attack, killing at least 25,700 Palestinians and injuring 63,740 others. Nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas attack.

The Israeli war has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while more than half of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala